


when the earth is trembling

by stammiviktor



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Date Night, Developing Relationship, First Kiss, Fluff, Insecure Crowley (Good Omens), Light Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, POV Aziraphale (Good Omens), Post-Canon, Romance, angst: one-sided, crêpes: served, love: requited
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-07-11 18:55:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,293
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19932886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stammiviktor/pseuds/stammiviktor
Summary: “Do you like it?” Crowley asks, and it seems to be a genuine question. As if there were a real possibility Aziraphale could say no—as if he might say,Actually, darling, this is far too much too fastand get up and leave.Preposterous.





	when the earth is trembling

**Author's Note:**

> oh, hello again
> 
> (thank you so much again to [sunnydisposish](https://sunnydisposish.tumblr.com/) for beta-ing!)
> 
> _And when the Earth is trembling on some new beginning [...]_  
>  Love, won't you be as you've always been.  
> -Hozier, "Be"

The walk from Aziraphale’s bookshop to Crowley’s apartment on a cool summer evening is one of the finer pleasures in life. From door to door it only takes ten minutes, but Aziraphale leaves a quarter of an hour before he is due at Crowley’s so he can stop and smell the metaphorical roses.

Crowley had bought this apartment long after Aziraphale opened his bookshop in Soho and they established their primary clandestine meeting point in St. James’ Park, just a few blocks out of the way of where Aziraphale walks now. The Mayfair apartment, a pinnacle of post-war modernism and chic elegance, became the third point of the triangle they’d carved out of central London. Crowley had come up with all manner of clever excuses for the apartment’s location—increasing market value, strategically located near the crucial site of a particularly clever wile-in-progress he refused to divulge. The truth, that the aforementioned wile involved a certain angel and wasn’t very wily at heart at all, was never acknowledged. 

They can acknowledge it now, Aziraphale realizes quite suddenly. He could very well go up to that man at the newspaper stand across the street and say, “Hello, good evening sir, I would like to inform you that Anthony J. Crowley, by most accounts my sworn enemy, bought that apartment just at the end of the block so that he wouldn’t have to go all the way back to Whitechapel every time we were done “fraternizing”. It made me quite inexplicably happy at the time that he would do such a thing, though I never let myself admit it.” 

He won’t say that, of course. No use over-sharing. But it is quite nice to know that he could, to have all the cards on the table with Heaven and Hell and so forth. It has only been about a week since things settled down, and there is still much to get used to.

In front of the sleek apartment building, feeling the normal amount of ‘out of place’ in his nineteenth century waistcoat, Aziraphale presses button 3B and waits until Crowley buzzes him inside without a word over the intercom. He takes the stairs, knocks three times, and hears a quite muffled, “Coming, coming, hold on—”

The first thing Aziraphale notices is the apron. It’s blood-red, no-nonsense—unlike the frilly kind he occasionally took to wearing during his time as a nanny—and has the words _DEVIL’S FOOD CAKE_ printed in cursive across the chest with a little cartoon drawing of the aforementioned dessert with horns, fangs, and a spiked tail.

“Angel,” he greets. He’s not wearing sunglasses, and watching his eyes light up is a rare treat for Aziraphale.

The second thing Aziraphale notices is the smell. It hits him in a thick wave—two parts browned butter, one part gas. 

“Are you… cooking?”

“I thought I’d try my hand at it.”

“Have you _ever_ used this kitchen before?”

“A bit. Sometimes. No, not really. Certainly not the stove, which is extremely determined to try my patience,” he growls. “It seems to think that just because I haven’t used it in a decade or four gives it the right to spew gas wherever it wants.”

Aziraphale pales. “That seems quite dangerous.”

“It’s under control. Come in, let me take your coat.”

“Um. Alright, thank you. Do you… have a coatrack?”

“I do now,” Crowley replies with a wave of his hand. 

Aziraphale steps inside and is enveloped in a wave of heat coming from the kitchen. Crowley, cold-blooded snake that he is, probably has left the fan off on purpose.

“I thought we were ordering in,” Aziraphale says weakly as he takes a seat on one of the barstools at the kitchen island. “You mentioned that new Indian restaurant down the street…”

Crowley shrugs. “Thought I’d try something different. Brave new world, and all that. Hopefully you don’t mind being my guinea pig.”

“Oh? What are you making?”

“Crêpes, if the next batch decides not to burn.”

Aziraphale straightens. Blinks. “Crêpes?”

“I was under the impression you were fond of them. What with that ‘almost getting beheaded’ nonsense. Let them eat crêpes, right?”

“Cake,” Aziraphale replies automatically. “But actually, I’m fairly certain it was neither.”

“Well, the recipe made it look easy. So did the videos. You know they have people on the internet whose entire job it is to explain how to make food into a video camera?” Crowley scowls as he brandishes his spatula at a pile of crêpes, some very pale and some very brown. “I’m a bit miffed I didn’t think of this myself, actually. The frustration of thousands of humans following a video recipe down to every last detail and _still_ ending up with something nearly inedible? Would’ve been a stroke of genius, even better than the M40.”

“I’m sure they are delicious.” They certainly smell it, once you get past the lingering stench of gas.

“A few of them will be at least edible. I’ll make sure of it,” Crowley grumbles, and flips a crêpe in the pan. “In the meantime, would you like an aperitif?”

“Oh, that would be lovely. Do you have any Aperol? I’ve been craving a spritz, as of late.”

Crowley waves a hand and a bottle of orange-colored liqueur appears on the counter. Aziraphale huffs.

“Crowley…” 

“Just for you, angel.”

When the food is ready, they sit down at a small dining table that has probably seen as much action in the past half-century as the stove. The place settings, likely miracled into existence, rival those of the Ritz.

Crowley places in front of Aziraphale a plate of crêpes so beautifully presented that it’s hard to believe this was his first attempt, let alone that he’d had trouble along the way. But that is Crowley for you, Aziraphale supposes. He has always had an eye for detail and a very signature flair. 

“Crêpes à la Crowley, with herbed chèvre, avocado, and a finely-sliced chicken breast, topped with a sprig of asparagus and a drizzle of peach balsamic reduction.”

“Crowley, this is…” Aziraphale trails off, his mouth watering. He looks up to find a strange vulnerability on Crowley’s face as he waits for Aziraphale to finish.

“Just try it,” he urges.

Aziraphale does. It’s an explosion of flavor and texture in his mouth. The crêpe is a little too thick, but the creaminess of the goat’s cheese paired with the sweet tang of the balsamic and the smoothness of the avocado—

“It’s as delicious as it looks!” he exclaims. “Really, my dear, it is stunning.”

Crowley appears to relax, sitting back in his chair and looking from the plate to Aziraphale back to the plate again. “Y’think so?”

“Of course, try it for yourself! Were you expecting me to hate it?”

“Well.” Crowley shrugs. “I’ve never tried this before. _We’ve_ never… I mean, first times and all that.” 

“Well, I’d hardly believe it was your first time.” 

“I have a lot of experience on the other side. You know, the eating part. And I really did watch a lot of those infernal _Tasty_ videos…”

Crowley is right. They haven’t done this before, not quite like this. It’s quite a departure from their normal, one that only a few months ago might have been met with a bout of nervous resistance from Aziraphale. He would have given in fairly quickly, though, as he always does when it’s Crowley that’s pushing.

And Crowley _is_ pushing, right up against the boundaries they’d drawn between them centuries ago that had been eroding ever since. Normally this would frighten Aziraphale, send him home thinking about ineffability and loyalty and where exactly his should lie. There was never a good answer. Never one that didn’t hurt. So when Crowley pushed too hard, Aziraphale would always push back—

Except now. Except tonight, and (with any luck) all the tonights for the rest of eternity. Crowley pushes, and Aziraphale is free to give in all he wants.

Crowley looks at Aziraphale devouring a plate of crêpes like he’s expecting to have to defend why it’s totally ethical for the angel to eat them. He’s still expecting pushback, that much is obvious in the way he tries just a _little_ too hard to lounge slyly in his chair.

Aziraphale smiles softly, ease radiating from him in waves. He reaches over and picks up Crowley’s fork and knife, cutting him a piece off of his own still-untouched plate. “Try it,” he commands, holding out the fork. Crowley does and his yellow eyes go wide.

“Oh. Bloody heaven.”

“Yes, it seems you’re quite good at this.”

“I’m just reliev— _glad_ that you like it.”

“I love it. This is a lovely surprise, Crowley, truly.”

Crowley smirks. “Good to know I can still surprise you. Six-thousand years of friendship, don’t want to get _too_ predictable.”

The word _friendship_ is weighted, holds depths that the English language can’t quite capture—like he means something else entirely, but this is the closest thing he can think of in their current form of communication. Perhaps, in Enochian or another ancient celestial language, he could capture it better. Aziraphale thinks about it, but comes up blank. 

They finish their crêpes and sip on the remnants of their spritzes, enjoying each other’s company. For the first time since he arrived, he notices what Crowley is wearing beneath the apron.

“You’re awfully dressed up,” he observes. Slacks and a nice black button-down, fitted very well.

“That’d be the second part of the surprise.” 

_“Second_ part?”

Crowley glances down at his watch and stands. “We’d better get going, actually.”

“Where?” 

“That’s the surprise, now isn’t it?” he calls from the other room. He emerges a minute later wearing a dark red tie and black suit jacket—well fitted _indeed._

“I’ll be underdressed!” 

Crowley snaps his fingers and there’s an instantaneous _whoosh_ of air around Aziraphale’s body.

“Oh,” he gasps. “This is my suit.” It’s cream-colored with a beige dress shirt and a robin’s-egg bowtie. He had bought it decades ago but hadn’t had much occasion to wear it since.

“Mhm. And your other clothes are back home in your closet now, right where these came from.”

“Oh. Well, thank you. Are you sure I—"

“You look dapper. Absolutely darling. Are you ready to go? Don’t want to be late.”

—

As if they could ever be late with the way Crowley drives. They don’t have far to go, either—Royal Festival Hall is just across the Thames. Aziraphale gasps and clutches his heart.

“The Philharmonic?”

Crowley grins. “Maybe.”

“Oh. My goodness.” 

“We’ve never gone before. Seemed a good a time as any to fix that.” 

They both know full well why they’ve never attended the symphony together. They’d met up at a random concert here and there to discuss the rearing of the Antichrist, but this? Suit and tie, side by side? Never. 

They park the Bentley and walk together into the hall, Crowley flashing a set of tickets that he doesn’t let Aziraphale see. They are ushered up a few flights of stairs, down a lushly carpeted hallway, towards…

 _“Box_ seats?”

Crowley holds the curtain open for Aziraphale to reveal plush seats that look down on the stage from above. There are four places, but the other two remain empty. Aziraphale feels suddenly quite warm inside.

“Do you like it?” Crowley asks, and it seems to be a genuine question. As if there were a real possibility Aziraphale could say no—as if he might say, _Actually, darling, this is far too much too fast_ and get up and leave.

Preposterous.

“Yes, of course! Oh, I can see the bassoons! You can never see the bassoons.” On the stage, a flautist warms up with a bit of familiar melody and makes the hair on the back of Aziraphale’s neck stand straight up. _“Oh!”_

“You recognize it?” 

_“Pictures at an Exhibition?_ Who wouldn’t? Oh, I haven’t heard it live since… The 1920s, I believe. It really is one of my favorites, you’ve heard _The Great Gate of Kiev?_ Truly, my dear, you are in for a treat. This is Mussorgsky at his finest, I assure you—or rather, Ravel, it’s his orchestration that has become so famous, since the original was written for solo piano. How did you know?”

Crowley chuckles. “I’ve heard good things, but I didn’t realize you loved it so much. Lucky, that.”

“Well, I did love the Romantic period as a general rule. You were asleep for most of it, if I recall correctly. You really missed out.”

“Look at the bright side, angel: now I’ll get to hear it for the first time with you.” 

Aziraphale swallows. Even after the orchestra strikes up the first note, even well into the third or fourth section of the suite, the words still ring in his ears: _with you, with you, with you..._

The piece is a journey in every sense of the word—quite literally a religious experience in Aziraphale’s slightly blasphemous opinion, though as an angel he thinks he can get away with it. If God had at least a modicum of taste, She would listen to the _Great Gate_ section—the culmination, the climax, the _apotheosis_ —and agree. With every repetition of the melody the orchestra’s power builds, a hundred voices weaving together into a harmonic sucker punch that strikes the audience again and again. Aziraphale grasps his chest with one hand and reaches out to Crowley with the other.

Crowley’s breathless gasp weaves into the symphony of sound; their fingers weave together and he grasps him back. 

They only let go when it is time to applaud; they give a standing ovation and Aziraphale cheers loudly. At his side, Crowley looks like he wants to say something but can’t quite find the words. While the conductor bows, Aziraphale’s eyes skim the audience below and he notices a few concertgoers looking up at them; he realizes, not for the first time tonight, just how visible they are. Only a few weeks ago, such an outing would have been an unjustifiable risk. An impossibility. Yet here they are.

He knows how they must look, the two of them: like they belong to each other. Something burns in Aziraphale’s chest, something quite like longing. When they exit the concert hall, Crowley holds the door and ushers him through with a light touch on his upper back. Even behind the sunglasses, Aziraphale can see a question in his eyes: _is this okay?_

He’s pushing, still pushing. Aziraphale smiles and walks right alongside him.

“Have you ever been to Kiev?” Crowley asks as they make their way down the street to the car park. He had parked toward the back where there were fewer cars to make sure no elderly concertgoers side-swiped the Bentley. 

“No, have you?” 

“No.” He pauses. “Would you like to?”

There’s something in Crowley’s tone that makes Aziraphale pause. “…What, _now?”_

“No, no! That seems much too hasty.”

“Right.”

“But I’m not doing anything next week.” 

Aziraphale can’t help but laugh. “Neither am I, actually. Perhaps we could pop on by Leningrad while we’re over there? I have heard the Hermitage is lovely. And I am rather fond of borscht, but only when it is made properly.”

Crowley looks a bit like Aziraphale just ran him over with the Bentley. All he manages to say is, “It’s called St. Petersburg now, I think.”

“Right. We could travel the human way, you know! Avoid attracting too much unwanted attention.”

They’ve arrived at the Bentley now. Aziraphale turns his back on the passenger side door to look back at Crowley, whose hand twitches as if debating opening it for him. The sounds of the city envelop them, but the back of the car park is dark and mostly empty.

“You really want to do that, angel?” 

Aziraphale reaches out and carefully pulls off Crowley’s glasses. The demon’s entire body is expressive, his swinging hips and slinging eyebrows, but it’s his eyes that Aziraphale loves the most yet does not always have the chance to see. Right now, there’s something quite desperate flickering in those yellow irises, something Crowley tries to cover though he doesn’t quite succeed. 

Aziraphale folds the sunglasses and carefully places them in Crowley’s front suit pocket. “Well it’s no Alpha Centauri…” 

Crowley snorts. “Right.”

“But with you, of course I do. Anywhere you want to go,” Aziraphale replies, an echo of an old conversation that hadn’t ended well for either of them. Crowley had been the one offering, _pushing,_ and Aziraphale had rejected him. Even behind his John Lennon glasses, Aziraphale had been able to see the devastation that wrought.

Crowley isn’t even being subtle now, not by any stretch of the imagination. He’s lingering close, his eyes blown wide and flickering over Aziraphale’s face again and again, always returning to his mouth. He’s waiting. Watching. Daring Aziraphale to turn him away, here at the final frontier.

He doesn’t.

Crowley surges forward, capturing Aziraphale’s lips in his, and Aziraphale opens his arms to catch him. He holds him, holds him tight, receives every last bit of the longing on Crowley’s forked tongue and feeds it back to him with reverence. Crowley’s lips are cool but every other bit of him is burning, melting, shuddering under Aziraphale’s touch. The angel cups his face, runs fingers over his cheekbones and eyebrows and the serpent tattooed near his right ear.

In the middle of London, Aziraphale worships his demon, his friend, his partner, his _everything_ in that quiet, gentle way he has always secretly longed for. He holds him close and presses unapologetic devotion into his skin.

In his arms, Crowley slumps downward, burying his face in Aziraphale’s neck with a muffled, breathless cry of, “ _Angel…"_

“I’m afraid I am quite done hiding,” Aziraphale sighs as he strokes Crowley’s hair; perhaps he will grow it out again if Aziraphale asks. “From myself, from Heaven and Hell… from you.”

Crowley croaks a laugh into Aziraphale’s throat. “I knew, angel. I always knew.”

“I knew, too. You were never very good at it, either.”

“Well, ‘s not like I was trying very hard to hide it. Not from you, at least. Thought I was being rather obvious, actually.” 

“I’m ready now,” Aziraphale promises. “I might need a little push from time to time, but I’m ready.”

Crowley straightens in Aziraphale’s arms and looks down at him with a bewildered smile. “I must admit, this is not how I thought this night would go.”

“No? And are you disappointed?”

“Please!” Crowley barks a laugh as he circles around to the driver’s side. “Now, could I tempt you to a nightcap?”

“Hm, that depends. Do you have any sherry?” 

Crowley snaps his fingers. “There happens to be a bottle of Amontillado chilling in the fridge as we speak.” 

“What a lovely coincidence! In that case, I think I might have to give in to your wily ways.”

As they speed out of the parking lot, Aziraphale—who, as an angel, has a sixth sense for this sort of thing—notices for the first time the unrestrained waves of _love_ radiating off of Crowley and filling the inside of the Bentley. There has always been love here, with how much the demon has doted on this car, much the same way Aziraphale feels about his book collection. But something has been cut loose tonight; Aziraphale can feel it enveloping him and filling his lungs to bursting. 

Crowley’s speedometer rockets toward ninety miles per hour and Aziraphale gasps, grasping the arm rests out of habit. Nearly a century, and he’s never gotten used to this.

“Too much?” Crowley asks, his eyes flickering toward the passenger seat with a flash of uncertainty. Aziraphale just grins.

“Faster, darling. _Faster.”_

**Author's Note:**

> These two will be the death of me adfjkhs. Thank you so much for reading! Please leave a comment and let me know what you think <3 
> 
> find me on tumblr at [stammiviktor](https://stammiviktor.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
